


Here It Goes Again

by chamel



Series: You Left Me Under Your Spell: A Collection of CaraDin Short Stories [14]
Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: (technically) - Freeform, BAMF Cara Dune, Canon Compliant, Din Djarin Removes the Helmet, Episode: s02e07 The Believer, F/M, Friends to Lovers, Hurt/Comfort, Mandalorian Culture (Star Wars), Mission Fic, POV Din Djarin, Temporary Character Death, The Force, The Mandalorian (TV) Season 2, The Mandalorian (TV) Spoilers, Time Loop, Trust, What-If, and Cara helps him process that, chapter 15
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2021-01-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:35:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28264023
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chamel/pseuds/chamel
Summary: “I think I’m reliving the day,” Din tells them two iterations later.They’ve already picked up Mayfeld and are in the process of going over the plan to get the coordinates from the terminal on Morak. Din just drops it on them, because he doesn’t really know how to soften the blow. Fine, they’re going to think he’s crazy. Whatever. As long as they listen to him. The problem is, sometimes they don’t want to—one of them gets hung up on a particular strategy that never goes right—so he’s trying something different this time.(When the mission to Morak turns disastrous, Din gets a chance to try again. And again, and again, and again.)
Relationships: Din Djarin & Cara Dune, Din Djarin/Cara Dune
Series: You Left Me Under Your Spell: A Collection of CaraDin Short Stories [14]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1680589
Comments: 111
Kudos: 212





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm BAAAAACK! Did you miss me?? (LOL don't answer that) I've missed you all!
> 
> Turns out I definitely can't write stories until the season is done. I got the idea for this fic after Chapter 15 aired, but I couldn't even start it until I'd seen the final episode. I'm probably the only one who was excited that we never got to see the fallout of Din removing his helmet because it meant I could write this and not have to worry about canon stuff. Basically, this fic explores the question of: what if the events of Chapter 15 were just the last, successful iteration of a time loop? And the reason that Din seems (relatively) ok with taking off his helmet is that he's worked through the issues around it a bunch of times before that (with Cara's help of course)? For me, the fact that he was wearing his Mandalorian helmet at the end seemed rather sudden given everything we know about his devotion to the creed, and this is my way of dealing with that.
> 
> (I wrote a time loop fic in another fandom and loved it so much and apparently I have NOT YET gotten it out of my system, lolol)
> 
> I must apologize profusely about being so MIA with my reading and commenting on everyone's stuff. Hopefully I'll be able to catch up some over the holidays, although I won't be reading any fics dealing with the end of the season until after I finish this work, sorrrrry.
> 
> Title/lyrics from the song "Here It Goes Again" by Ok Go.

_Just when you think you're in control_  
_Just when you think you've got a hold_  
_Just when you get on a roll_  
_Oh, here it goes_  
_Here it goes again_

The mining installation on Morak doesn’t look all that different from the base on Nevarro, at least to him. Set partly underground, a few defensible points of access, full of a bunch of stormtroopers, etc etc etc. Mayfeld warns them that there should be a decent contingent of officers present in the facility, but otherwise Din can’t see a reason why they shouldn’t hit it like they hit the installation on Nevarro. Sure, things got a little hairy toward the end of that one, but their team is bigger now. Cara agrees with him, and most of the others seem content to go along with the direct approach, save perhaps Mayfeld. The ex-Imperial sharpshooter is certainly more reticent about the plan, but that could be because he’s the one who has to be most out in the open to access the terminal.

In the end, he shrugs and says, “well, between this and cutting up scrap for the rest of my life, I guess it’s not such a bad option.”

“We’re not losing anyone,” Cara states confidently as she checks over her rifle again. “Don’t worry, you’ll be back to cutting scrap before tomorrow.”

“Gee, thanks,” Mayfeld grumbles.

Din tunes them out and goes over the plan in his head again. Drop in from above (Cara’s idea, naturally), blow the wall of the room _next_ to the officer’s mess (or else they could accidentally destroy the terminal, Mayfeld says), Fennec and Cara clear as much of the place as they can while he gets Mayfeld to the terminal (both women sneer at the insinuation that it will be any trouble at all), and Fett swings by on _Slave 1_ to pick them up once they have the coordinates (they won’t even have time to get TIE fighters in the air, Fett insists).

Seems simple enough. Which is why he should have known it would all go to hell.

The first parts of the plan work ok, but there are a _lot_ more Imps on the installation than they planned for. There’s also the fact that the officer’s mess seems to be located very near a major access point for rhydonium deliveries, and he’s not sure how they didn’t notice that on the scans, but it’s only sheer dumb luck that the blast they use to infiltrate the facility doesn’t set off a chain reaction of explosions through the whole place. Blaster bolts clang loudly off Din’s armor as he and Mayfeld scramble across the open ground to the mess hall, but it’s only once they’re inside—once they can see the terminal, and it seems like they might actually pull this off—that things take a turn for the worse.

It’s the false sense of security that brings them down, he thinks. There’s only one door to the officer’s mess, so once they clear the small room it seems almost trivial to pick off anyone who tries to come through the door. He can hear the sounds of increasingly desperate fighting from outside, but he can’t think about that right now. Cara and Fennec are more than capable of holding their own. If something were to happen to change that… well, he can’t think about that right now. And he certainly can’t think about it when the Imps apparently decide to breach the wall in their own compound, blowing a new hole in the side of the mess hall.

Din had been watching the door when the wall exploded, so he loses track of Mayfeld when the force of the blast throws him into the far corner of the room along with a large amount of rubble. He hits the wall hard enough that his vision momentarily blacks out, leaving a lingering ringing in his ears that lasts long past the resonance of his helmet. Thankfully he’s only stunned for a second, and he shakes it off as well as he’s able when he hears a groan from under the rubble beside him. Pushing off the largest blocks of concrete and plaster, he finds Mayfeld with a long piece of steel rebar projecting from his side.

 _Dank farrik_. Storm troopers are pouring in through the new hole in the wall, and also through the main doorway thanks to the fact that Din isn’t defending it anymore. He shakes Mayfeld’s shoulder as gently as he can manage after confirming that he’s not, in fact, dead, and the other man’s eyelids flutter open.

“S’the terminal intact?” Mayfeld slurs, which is honestly a pretty incredible question from someone who can’t sit up.

Din glances back, and sure enough, the terminal is still standing with Mayfeld’s data key in place. “Yeah,” he confirms. “C’mon, we gotta get out of here.” He moves to try to help Mayfeld up, sliding a hand under one of his shoulders, but is firmly rebuffed.

“I’m toast, man,” Mayfeld groans, struggling weakly in Din’s grasp. “Data should be on the drive. Take it and go. Get your kid.”

“We can make it,” Din insists. “Both of us.”

Mayfeld opens his mouth to protest, but whatever he’d about to say is lost in a truly massive explosion from the next room. Some of the rhydonium must have gotten triggered, which at this point was hardly surprising, but that doesn’t mean Din’s heart doesn’t seem to stutter to a stop. _Cara_.

The last he’d seen them, Cara and Fennec were busy taking out squadrons of troopers in the main cargo area, but maybe they’d moved on. Maybe they weren’t in that room when it blew. Maybe. He looks down at Mayfeld, who appears to be rapidly losing conciousness, and hesitates.

“Get out of here, you bastard,” Mayfeld coughs, coming back to himself for a moment.

Din takes the permission, scrambling over to the terminal and cursing the whole time. He grabs the stick drive out of the machine, not even bothering to check if the data actually downloaded, and runs toward the door in under a hail of blaster bolts. What he finds on the other side nearly sends him reeling into a massive, smoldering pit of rubble.

There had been a large, open space here when they’d come in, full of juggernauts and other transports and crates… and people. It’s almost all gone now, turned into lumps of stone and twisted bits of metal. Along the edges there’s some movement, but anyone caught in the center must have been nearly vaporized.

“Cara!” he yells as he stumbles out along the perimeter of the pit, looking for any sign of either woman. “Fennec! _Cara!_ ”

It’s useless. He knows it’s useless. The odds that either of them survived the blast are incredibly low, but something inside him just refuses to accept that outcome. He did not go pull _her_ from a happy life on Nevarro just to lose her now. Besides, Cara is too tough. Surely a little rhydonium explosion isn’t enough to take her out. Not to mention Fennec is pretty much half mechanical by now, and anyway he’s pretty sure Fett will have his head if she’s lost. He’ll find them. He will.

The problem is, there are still plenty of Imps that weren’t caught in the rhydonium explosion. Din is still scrambling around the edges of the pit, looking for a telltale scrap of teal amongst the brown and black, when the grenade comes clattering into his field of view. For a moment he just stares at it, like he doesn’t understand what’s happening, and dimly he wonders just how hard he hit his head when he’d been blown across the mess hall. Hard enough to make him hesitate too long triggering his jetpack, at the very least.

Theoretically, the grenade blast shouldn’t kill him. But that’s contingent on no large pieces of shrapnel finding their way between the beskar plates, and it’s also contingent on the blast being only a grenade. Not a grenade that’s rolling around amongst still-smoldering splatters of rhydonium. The heat of the resulting blast overwhelms him, whiting out his vision from the all-encompassing pain.

He knows right away, with a deep and utter certainty, that he’s not going to make it. Din’s always been good at getting out of situations that seem impossible. He’d almost say he has a special knack for it. But this time? This time he has failed. He has failed his team, he has failed his creed, and most importantly, he has failed the kid.

Grogu. He’d still been getting used to the name, to be honest. He turns it over in his mind now, as he lies there among the rubble, dying. Grogu. Grogu. I have failed you. Forgive me.

 _Not yet_ , comes an answer he certainly doesn’t expect.

He forces his eyes open, but he doesn’t seem to be in the compound anymore. The world around him is fuzzy, or at least as fuzzy as a featureless environment can be. He pushes himself up to standing and realizes he can’t feel the pain anymore. Everything is just kind of dull. Is this what death feels like?

 _Not exactly_.

Din whips around, looking for the source of the voice, but he can’t see anything around him. If it can even properly be called a voice; he doesn’t seem to be hearing it, really, can’t assign a pitch or a tone to it. It’s more like he’s _feeling_ it. Which makes no sense whatsoever.

 _It is the Force,_ the voice tells him.

Oh great, the Force. That clears everything up.

 _Father_ , the voice says, and all at once Din is filled with a blistering warmth, like someone just lit a small star inside him. It’s nothing like the heat of the explosion; no, this bring with it nothing but happiness and contentment. It’s love, he realizes, in its purest form.

 _Father_.

Din blinks rapidly, spinning around again, but nothing about his surroundings has changed. It can’t be, can it? He has to be parsecs away.

_I am. I am also here, with you._

But how?

The voice—Grogu?—hesitates for a moment, as if weighing an attempt to explain. _It is the Force_ , he repeats.

Are you free? Are you safe? Din doesn’t dare to hope, but—

 _No. I’m waiting for you_.

But I’ve failed you, Din thinks brokenly. I’ll be dead soon, if I’m not already. Please forgive me.

 _Not yet,_ the kid repeats. _Try again_.

* * *

Din wakes with a splitting headache.

It’s dark wherever he is, but unlike the odd plane he’d just found himself on, he can sense his surroundings. The thin pad of foam beneath him. The quiet hiss of a ship during a night cycle. The smell of gun oil and fuel and four adult humans packed into an enclosed space.

He lets out a long, relieved breath. It was all a dream. The disastrous mission, losing his whole team, dying on Morak… all just a terrible dream. The most vivid dream he’s ever had, but a dream nonetheless. They’re still en route to pick up Mayfeld. For a moment he lies there, listening to the soft sound of Cara’s breathing in the small compartment and trying not to think about the feeling of gut-wrenching loss that had filled him when he thought she was dead. In the dream. It was only a dream.

Unfortunately, it becomes harder and harder to convince himself of that fact as the day goes on. He is struck by an uncanny sense of deja vu as they approach the Karthon Chop Fields, but it’s more than that. He doesn’t just feel like he has done this before, he _knows_ he has. Every comment, every small choice: everything is identical. He can picture the look on Mayfeld’s face before he steps off the ship, can hear his snide comments as he questions what he’s doing here. The sense of disquiet grows stronger and stronger with every hour, until he feels like he’s slowly going insane. This is impossible. _Impossible_.

He doesn’t tell anyone about it. They’re just going to think he’s losing it, and frankly he’s not sure that he isn’t. Still, he can’t help but propose a different plan of attack as they’re plotting out the operation. There’s nothing crazy about suggesting that there are more Imps on the installation than they expect, and if they think it’s odd that he knows where there are major caches of rhydonium are, no one says anything. They make a plans for a stealth infiltration overland, going for several spots that seem weakest at the perimeter of the compound. It should work.

It doesn’t. There are far too many traps around around the installation. He’s not even surprised, really. Something about it seems almost inevitable, like he knows it’s going to fail even before they begin. Which is pretty kriffing bleak, if he thinks about it too hard. Maybe _this_ is also a dream. Maybe he still hasn’t woken up. It seems more likely than the alternative.

* * *

“I think I’m reliving the day,” he tells them two iterations later.

They’ve already picked up Mayfeld and are in the process of going over the plan to get the coordinates from the terminal on Morak. Din just drops it on them, because he doesn’t really know how to soften the blow. Fine, they’re going to think he’s crazy. Whatever. As long as they listen to him. The problem is, sometimes they don’t want to—one of them gets hung up on a particular strategy that never goes right—so he’s trying something different this time.

“I think you’ve been hit one too many times in the can, there, Mando,” Mayfeld tells him predictably, looking more than a little apprehensive.

“Maybe it was just a vivid dream,” Fennec suggests.

“How could that even be possible?” Fett asks skeptically.

“I don’t know,” Din sighs. He doesn’t tell them about the odd fuzzy space he’d found himself in after the first iteration, or the odd disembodied voice, because he’s pretty sure that will just make him sound crazier. “I can’t explain it, but I know things about the installation that I shouldn’t, because I’ve been there. I’ve seen the outcome of the day when we try to drop in with force, and I’ve seen the outcome when we try to sneak in over ground. It always fails.”

Everyone stares at him for just long enough for things to get uncomfortable, like they’re expecting him to tell them he’s just joking, but they also can’t quite believe he’s capable of making a joke. He’s not sure whether to feel more offended that they don’t want to take him seriously, or that they think he’s that humorless.

“So what’s the approach, then?” Cara asks eventually.

Din turns to look back at where she stands behind the rest of them, leaning on the back of a folded up seat. Unlike the others, there’s no incredulity or skepticism or concern for his mental stability in her gaze; she looks concerned, sure, but only in as much as she has since she told him that Gideon had take the kid. She’s regarding him like it’s just another mission, and she is ready to throw down with whatever he says. Not for the first time, his heart aches with gratitude. And, well, maybe something else, but now is not the time for… _that_.

“There are still a few possible points of entry we haven’t tried. Potential weak spots in the defenses, here and here,” he says, shoving all throughts besides those relevant to the mission to the side and pointing to the flickering projection of the mining installation floating over the ship’s controls.

“What about this passage, here?” Fennec asks, indicating a seemingly useful underground tunnel.

Din shakes his head. “Rigged to blow. We die in the collapse.”

“And this bank of windows?” Fett proposes.

“Too far away from the terminal. We can’t make it across the compound in time.”

They continue to quiz him for a while longer, but if they’re trying to stump him it’s not going to work. Unfortunately they seem to only get more agitated and uncertain the more he tells them, as if confronting the truth of the situation is too much. He can’t blame them, really; if someone he was supposed to be pulling off a potentially deadly operation with just told him something that called into question their grip on reality, he’d be really kriffing worried too. Maybe it was a mistake to tell them.

Eventually they agree on trying out one of Din’s proposed approaches, although something about the looks that Fennec and Fett exchange don’t sit right with him. It’s not that he doesn’t trust them, but he’s starting to think that they might not trust _him_. Which is going to be a problem. Everyone disperses as much as they can around the small cabin of the ship, grabbing guns to check over before the operation; everyone except Cara, who slips a hand around his arm and tugs him off into a separate compartment.

“We need to talk,” she mutters under her breath, glancing back to make sure no one else is listening.

“Is this some kind of intervention?” he asks dryly.

Cara rears back slightly, blinking at him in surprise, but she doesn’t drop his arm. Instead she squeezes it tighter, which is kind of nice, if he’s honest. Grounding. He doesn’t get touched a lot, except during fights. Or by the kid. Best not to start thinking about that.

“What? No,” she says, her brow furrowing. “Look, I believe you, but there’s something you’re not saying. I don’t know why, but I can tell. So, spill it.”

Why is he not surprised he can’t keep anything from her? Sometimes it seems like she has some kind of x-ray vision that can see right through beskar. “I think I know what caused the loop.”

“That’s good, though, right?” she replies, looking unmistakably hopeful. “Then we know how to fix it?”

Din sighs. “We fix it by succeeding.” He pauses, but Cara is clearly waiting for him to elaborate. “It’s the kid. He’s doing this somehow. The first time, when I was dying, I… went somewhere. I don’t know where. But I heard him, or _felt_ him, really. He told me to try again, and, well.” He spreads out his hands, palms up.

It sounds insane, even to his own ears, but to his considerable surprise, Cara just looks at him, her eyes unerringly finding his past his helmet, and nods. “Do you think this time will work?”

“Not really, but it’s worth a shot.”

Cara takes this news with remarkable equanimity. “And if it doesn’t?”

“Then we all wake up again at the beginning of this day cycle, and none of you remember anything that happened before,” he tells her.

“It will,” she says confidently. Her lips curl into a smile that seems to briefly light him up from the inside. “I feel good about this one.”

It does not work.

Mostly the plan fails because clearly Fennec and Fett don’t believe him. He’s pretty sure that Mayfeld doesn’t either, but at least he’s more willing to just do as Din bids. Possibly out of fear that Cara will break him if he doesn’t. The other two are wild cards; they have their own ideas of how this should work, and instead of convincing them otherwise, the fact that he told them about the time loop just seems to have made them double down. They do not follow his directions, and this time he ends up pinned down with Cara behind a large shipping crate too far from the terminal to have any hope of reaching it before getting overwhelmed or blown to bits. He doesn’t even know where the others are, and it doesn’t really matter anymore.

“What’ll you do next loop?” Cara asks him, even as she reloads her gun with confident movements.

“Might not bother telling them,” he grunts out, raising from his crouch just enough to check their situation again. Yup. Still utterly surrounded.

Cara pauses in her reload and stares at him, something heavy in her gaze. “You tell me. I’ll believe you, every time, and I’ll help you. Promise?”

“Yeah,” Din agrees, “I promise.”

“Good. Ready to take out as many of these mudscuffers as we can before we go down in a blaze of glory together?”

She grins at him with sparkling eyes, like the idea of fighting to her certain death is exciting instead of terrifying, and Din is briefly overwhelmed by the sight of it. Who is this woman, who is so ready to give everything for him? For his kid? Besides one of Din’s few true friends in this kriffing galaxy, of course, but that doesn’t quite seem enough. There’s a reason he always returns to her when things get particularly tough, and it’s not just because she’s practically an unstoppable force of nature. No, there’s something else that brings him back, and it’s not something he has particularly wanted to try to put a name to, though it strikes him that now might not be a bad time to try.

Well, maybe not _now_ now. Cara is staring at him expectantly, so Din gives a single, short nod. “On three,” he says. “Together.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm planning on 2–3 chapters for this one, so you'll see us get closer and closer to the actual storyline of the episode as it progresses! I hope you've enjoyed this so far, and I'd love to hear what you think! Comments and kudos are greatly greatly appreciated and motivational!


	2. Chapter 2

The next few iterations he actually tries different ways of explaining of the situation to all of them in the hopes that he’ll find some way to get through to them. Eventually he gives up, though. It’s almost better if they _don’t_ know. For kicks, he tries a version where he proposes the same exact infiltration plan but he only tells Cara about the time loop, and they still don’t make it, but the whole thing goes much better when the others aren’t regarding him with ill-concealed suspicion.

Scratch that, it’s _definitely_ better if they don’t know.

“What if we just… go in the front door?” Cara says one early morning, about ten loops in, after he’s just explained all of their previous iterations.

They’re sitting together in the small compartment that they share on _Slave 1_. It was little more than a storage compartment that Fett had cleaned out for them, wide enough for two thin foam pads to sleep on and not much else, but it made for a good place to discuss the situation before the others awoke.

Din cocks his head at her and tries not to sound too skeptical. “The front door?”

“Yeah, look,” she explains. “You said there’s one way that’s basically wide open to get into the compound, and it’s where the juggernauts come in to deliver the rhydonium, right?”

“Right.”

Cara gives him a look like the conclusion should be obvious. “Soooo we steal a juggernaut and drive it in. Piece of cake.”

It’s not that the idea doesn’t have merit—hell, it’s more creative than anything he’s come up with to that point—but it sounds nothing like a _piece of cake_.

“You’re proposing that we steal an armored vehicle full of highly volatile starship fuel and just… drive it into the facility without them being any the wiser?”  
  
“Yeah,” she nods, grinning. “You got any better ideas?”  
  
“No,” Din allows, “I do not. But what makes you think that this will turn out any differently just because we get a ride to the entrance? They’ll still make us when we get out of the truck.”

“Obviously we take the Imps’ armor when we take the truck. A couple of Imperial officers won’t stick out. Then we get what we need without it turning into a firefight.”

“I see one problem with that.”

“Oh?” Cara prompts, arcing an eyebrow at him, and Din gestures down at his own armor. “That’s not a problem. I’ll go with Mayfeld,” she answers simply. “There are only two seats in the juggernauts, anyway. You stay back with the others and be ready to get us out of there once we have the coordinates.”

Din hums thoughtfully. It _could_ work, and she wasn’t wrong that they certainly lacked in better ideas. There were so many moving parts, though, things that had to happen in just the right way or they’d be toast, starting with somehow taking a juggernaut without blowing the sensitive rhydonium inside of it. Plus, even though Cara seemed confident that this infiltration wouldn’t end in a shootout, Din was less so, and two people armed only with Imperial-issue blasters stood a lot worse chance of getting out on their own.

It is as he is considering this latter point that it occurs to him, the realization smacking into him like a bucket of ice water.

“What happens if things go wrong, and you die, but I don’t? Because I’m not there?”

“I think you can answer that question better than me,” Cara says, although there’s no uncertainty in her tone. She knows just as well as he does what happens.

Din shakes his head vehemently. “No, that can’t— no,” he chokes out.

“As long as we get the coordinates—”

“ _No_ ,” he snaps, cutting her off. “You can’t just offer _that_.”

Cara scoffs at him, her expression narrowing to unmistakable anger. “Don’t you dare tell me what I can and can’t do, Djarin. I can, and I will. I already _have_ , just by agreeing to this. I accept that risk.”

Din decidedly does _not_ accept that risk. He is never one to send others in to do a job for him, never one to ask people to risk their lives while he sits around in relative safety. That’s just not him, and to ask that of him _now_ , when his life is the thing that’s actually expendable in this situation, is just. Unacceptable. As is the idea that there is a version of this scenerio where they get the coordinates and Cara doesn’t make it out alive. Technically, such a situation would be a success, but would feel like anything but when Din _knows_ he could have done something differently to change the outcome.

At the same time, he also knows he’s not going to get anywhere arguing this with Cara.All it’s going to do is make her more annoyed at him. That’s the last thing he wants in pretty much any situation, but even moreso now, when she’s his only confidant in all of this insanity. He supposes he’ll just figure it out as he goes, and if he has to… Well. He can make sure the day resets.

In the end, the argument is moot anyway. After he convinces them to set down a ways away from the installation in order to get a better look at the juggernauts, Mayfeld drops a bit of information that would probably have been helpful earlier.

“If you get scanned and your genetic signature shows up on any New Republic register, you’re gonna be detected, and it’s guns out,” he says.

Din is ashamed to admit how much relief this brings him. Of course, it doesn’t help their plan in the slightest. He shoots a glance over at Cara and sees her chewing her lower lip thoughtfully.

“Fennec can go, then,” she suggests. She _knows_ that he doesn’t like that idea any better than the original, but what options do they really have?

But then that is shot down too, as is the idea that Fett could take the second place. Which just leaves Din. He’s not on any New Republic registers, and not wanted by the ISB unless Gideon has somehow managed to get him on a list, but he doubts it. His chain code should be pretty clean. Next to him, Cara and Mayfeld are arguing about whether or not Mayfeld can go in alone, which is certainly not happening. Din tunes them out and scopes out one of the approaching juggernauts. The troopers inside are wearing helmets, and it’s obviously not optimal but it _would_ work.

“I’ll go,” Din says, and Cara gapes at him.

Mayfeld chuckles at this idea. “Hey, buddy, I might be good at fast talking, but I don't think I can explain away a guy in a Mando suit to Imperial guards. So unless you’re gonna take off that helmet, it’s gonna be me going in alone. Or say goodbye to your little green friend.”

“You’re not going alone,” Din tells him. “I’m coming with you. But I won’t be showing my face.”

The first time they try to hijack one of the juggernauts is an unmitigated disaster, as is the second. The troopers see them coming somehow, maybe some kind of monitoring system, and both attempts end up with the entire truck blowing sky high before they can even breach the cabin.

Din is starting to really hate rhydonium explosions.

When they discover the tunnel that all the juggernauts pass through on the way to the facility it seems like a gift, even moreso when it seems that there are maintenance shafts leading into the middle of it from within the hill. After a couple of tries they learn all of the blind spots and the pattern that the drivers always react in when someone drops into the cabin with them. Theoretically it would be easier for Din to do it because he can actually remember loop to loop, but something about his beskar armor always tips them off, so he walks Cara through it as best he can until finally it works.

They strip the armor off of the nameless troopers quickly, and Din takes the larger of the two sets back into one of the maintenance shafts without comment. It’s only when he’s standing there, looking down at the plasteel pieces laid out in front of him, that it strikes him how _weird_ it’s going to be. He hasn’t worn anything besides Mandalorian armor in a very long time, and he’s worn nothing except his own helmet on his head since he swore the creed. It’s fine, _it is_ , it’s just armor, but telling himself that doesn’t quite calm the sensation of discomfort that crawls through his veins as he begins to buckle on the inferior material.

He doesn’t know how long he stands there, holding the trooper’s helmet in his hands and staring down at it, but it must be quite a while. Long enough for Cara to call his name from the entrance to the maintenence shaft, her voice soft with concern. The interruption snaps him out of his tumultuous thoughts, and he answers with a quick affirmative before he drops the helmet decisively onto his head.

The dysphoria that immediately takes over him is _intense_. His body has a visceral, negative reaction to wearing the other helmet, to everything from the smell of someone else to the way it fits his head. Nausea threatens to overwhelm him, and his vision narrows far more than can be explained by the unfamiliar visor. Taking deep breaths to try to steady himself only makes everything that much worse.

“Cara,” he croaks out, hoping desperately she hasn’t gone far. He can’t quite manage to look up, but a moment later he feels strong arms wrapping around his chest, supporting him underneath his arms and, he realizes with a start, preventing him from pretty much keeling over on the spot.

“Hey, hey, you’re ok,” Cara murmurs, her face close to the helmet. “Talk to me.”

Din sucks in a deep breath, gritting his teeth and screwing his eyes shut against another wave of nausea. “I just— it’s— _wrong_.”

“Yeah, I figured,” she says. A moment later he feels her tugging the stolen glove off one of his hands and then her own bare hand laces with his. It’s another completely unfamiliar and frankly overwhelming sensation, though in this case a wholly positive one. His eyes fly open to find a somewhat hesitant smile on her face as she squeezes his hand in hers. “Just focus on this. You’re ok. You can do this.”

He closes his eyes again, trying to focus on the feeling of Cara’s hand in his, which is less difficult than he might have thought. His own palm is clammy but hers is warm and solid and seems to push some of the tightness out of his chest. Her other arm is still wrapped around him, and this time when he takes a deep breath he catches just a whiff of florals and fruits and a hint of vanilla. He’d noticed the new fragrance when they’d first reunited on Nevarro, but sharing the small compartment on _Slave 1_ had quite thoroughly embedded it into his brain even before this whole looping situation began. Now he tries to focus on it, lets it pull him out of the mire until the nausea is all but gone.

“Hey guys!” Mayfeld calls down the shaft. “Still on the clock here.”

“I’m ok,” Din manages, nodding as he stands up a little straighter and trying not to feel disappointed when Cara releases her grip on him. “I’ll be fine. Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Cara replies as plucks her glove off the ground and pulls it on.There’s a pause during which she clearly gives him a once over, then she smirks. “Wish I could say it looked good on you, but I’d be lying.”

“Yeah, well,” Din mutters, “feels like shit.” He pulls the stolen glove back on and grabs the bag containing all of his beskar, pushing it toward her. “Take care of this for me?”

The look on Cara’s face says she has some idea of what this means, but he doubt she grasps the full magnitude. For a Mandalorian to entrust someone else with the safekeeping of even part of their armor is… significant. It’s probably better if she _doesn't_ know how significant, honestly.

“I will,” she promises, taking the bag from him with reverence. “Now let’s get you out there.”

Din nods, takes a breath that manages not to be stomach turning, and leads the way to the main tunnel.

* * *

“There are kriffing _pirates_ ,” Din grumbles when he wakes up the next morning.

Next to him, Cara blinks awake in the darkness of the compartment, groaning softly as she does. He can just see her prop herself up on one elbow and push her hair back out of her face. “Wha…? Pirates? Where?”

“On Morak,” he sighs.

He’s gotten pretty good at bringing her up to speed as fast as possible, and true to her word, Cara never once questions his sanity. It would be almost disconcerting, how fully she trusts him, if it wasn’t also astoundingly comforting. Din’s pretty sure that no one save the kid has ever trusted him this completely, and the feeling that comes with it is heady, like he’s drunk on spotchka.

That doesn’t mean she’s not always trying to optimize the mission, to run it as efficiently as possible. Which he appreciates, but if there’s one thing he’s learned is that trying to run the mission as efficiently as possible always ends in disaster. The others get suspicious about how much they know, and things go wrong. Sometime he doesn’t even know why, but they do all the same. Certain events just need to happen in a particular way.

“Wait, why do we have to have this conversation?” she asks when he tells her about the argument with Mayfeld about who will go in the juggernaut. “Can’t you just say you’re going right away?”

Din shakes his head. “Apparently not.”

Cara huffs in frustration but accepts this assertion all the same. The rest of the briefing session goes relatively smoothly as he takes her through the steps for the successful hijacking of the juggernaut, right up until he mentions the armor switch.

“So do you want to talk about it?” she asks casually.

“What?”

“Wearing a different set of armor.”

Oh. He hadn’t told her about his little breakdown, but of course, somehow she can tell. Or maybe she just knows him well enough to know that there’s no way he would just simply be ok with trading out his own armor for stormtrooper duds.

“It’s… not great,” he says lamely, unable to quite put words to the feeling. “Most of it is fine. The helmet is not.”

Cara seems to consider this for a moment, tipping her head slightly as she regards him. “How not fine?”

“Huh?”

“I mean, how _not fine_ are we talking here?” she presses. She looks concerned for him, and it feels odd when he considers that it’s not about his physical safety. “Like, shrug-it-off not fine? Or freak-out not fine?”

Din sighs. “The latter. I got over it. You… helped.”

“That was good of me,” Cara says, a small smirk curling her lips. It makes Din huff out a laugh. “Look, I know _talking_ about stuff like this is not really your thing, but I think you need to if this is going to work.”

“I’m not sure that I can. Not that I can’t tell _you_ ,” he clarifies quickly, “I just— I can’t really explain it. It’s all wrong.” Din pauses, but this is apparently not enough talking about it, because Cara is still waiting, staring at him expectantly, so he tries again. “The stormtrooper helmet feels wrong. Smells really wrong. When I first put it on… well, I thought I was going to lose my lunch, to be honest with you. Or worse.”

Cara nods encouragingly. “So what helped?”

 _You_ , he doesn’t—and does, at some level—want to say. Of course, that’s the answer, isn’t it? He can’t quite figure out how to put it without giving too much away, though. “Well, ah, you came in and, er, _supported_ me. Held me up.”

“That’s all?”  
  
_No,_ he thinks. He can still feel her hand in his. The warm, sure comfort of it. The way her thumb had brushed gently over the back of his hand, almost absently. He can still smell the scent of her perfume, or soap, or whatever it is, although that could possibly be because they’re sitting so close together in the small compartment. All of it makes something within him ache. What would she say, if he asked for that comfort now? If he reached across the narrow space and twined their fingers together again? But it wouldn’t be _again_ for her.

“Yeah,” he finally says as he tries to push the fantasy out of his head. “It’s enough.” He’d like to pretend it could be. Who knows? Maybe this time, now that he’s gotten used to the foreign armor once, things will go better.

“Ok,” Cara nods, though she doesn’t entirely look as if she believes him. “Well, I’ll be there this time too. If you need me.”

“Thank you.”  
  
“Don’t mention it,” she says, unknowingly echoing herself. “I told you I’d help you, and I did. Just keeping my word.”  
  
“You don’t even remember saying that,” he points out. “You only know because I told you about it.”

Cara shrugs. “Feels like something I would say, though. C’mon,” she says abruptly, and he can feel a shift in the tone as the conversation swings back to the practical, “tell me about these pirates.”

* * *

It takes him more loops than he’d like to admit to crack the code on surviving the pirate attack. He’s been fighting in beskar for far too long and the stolen armor throws off his movements, not to mention that he gets killed more than a few times because he forgets that the shitty plasteel he’s wearing won’t protect him from certain attacks.

Every time, putting on the stolen helmet gets easier. He kind of wishes it wouldn’t, although he has no desire to go back to the panic and nausea of the first go-round. He doesn’t need Cara’s help past the first two iterations, which is good for keeping the mission moving forward but also powerfully disappointing. Probably also best if he doesn’t get used to the feeling of her hand in his, of how perfectly they fit together, of the warmth of her body as she supports his.

Now she waits outside the maintence shaft with Mayfeld, and every loop she smirks when she sees him and says the same thing. _Wish I could say it looked good on you, but I’d be lying_. Just one of those moments that proves that no matter how much it might seem to the contrary, she’s not immune to repeating herself in the loop. Reminds him that no matter how much she supports him, he’s ultimately alone in this. When they do finally succeed, she won’t remember anything else that has happened. She won’t remember the comfort she gave him, how she got him through this when he couldn’t do it on his own, but he _will_.

It leaves him feeling a little hollow. He can tell her, of course, but it’s not the same.

He also gets to hear Mayfeld’s little speech about how the Empire and the New Republic aren’t all that different ad nauseum. Sometimes Din argues with him, points out that the New Republic never blew up a planet full of innocent people for the hell of it. Of course, this usually triggers an argument from Mayfeld about how no one is truly innocent and how most of the Empires troopers are plucked from their families and given little other option besides death or service. After a while, Din gets tired of discussing it and instead just lets Mayfeld rant with minimal input.

 _Let’s get one thing straight: you and I are nothing alike_.

He finds himself saying those words at one point or another during most of the iterations. They’re like a lifeline, something to keep him afloat under Mayfeld’s unwittingly relentless onslaught. He still doesn’t understand how Mayfeld could claim that he and Din are the same, even as something about his words sink deeper into his psyche every iteration.

 _Everybody’s got their lines they don’t cross until things get messy_ , Mayfeld says, over and over again.

Talking with Cara about it is less than helpful, unfortunately. Turns out that the Alderaanian cannot quite get past her fury, and things don’t go well when she looks like she’s seconds away from murdering Mayfeld every time they have to interact. So for the most part, Din keeps Mayfeld’s somewhat nihilistic views on galactic government to himself, along with his views on Din’s potential moral flexibility. Not like it matters, anyway.

Eventually Din learns the rough pattern of the pirate’s attacks, and even if it can never properly be said to go _smoothly_ when it’s just him against all of them, the fight is at least successful. They make it to the facility in one piece and get out of the juggernaut to raucous cheering. If it’s this hard to get the rhydonium to the refinery on a daily basis, it’s astounding that the Empire ever gets anything out of this particular installation.

It’s kind of amazing how easy it is to just… walk through the facility without hardly garnering a second glance. Din has been inside this place quite a few times by now, but never like this. It almost seems _too_ easy when they can walk right up to the doorway of the officer’s mess without a single shot fired.

But then, Mayfeld glances inside the room and turns back to Din with his eyes wide. “I can’t go in there.”

Din leans to the side to look into the mess hall, but he can’t seem to see anything that might be a problem. A few officers are eating and mostly not paying attention to them. “Why not?” he asks.

“That’s Valin Hess,” Mayfeld hisses, like Din is supposed to know who that is.

“Who?”

Mayfeld grimaces. “Valin Hess. I used to serve under him.”

“Will he recognize you?”

“I don’t know. I was just a field operative, but I’m not taking the chance. It’s over,” Mayfeld says quickly, looking more and more agitated by the minute.

They have come much too far for this. Din has died an uncounted number of times—not that Mayfeld knows this—and has worked too hard to just walk away. He shakes his head. “Let’s just do this quick and we can get out of here.”

“I can’t do it, okay? We have to abort. I'm sorry.” He actually sounds apologetic, somewhat surprisingly.

“No,” Din says, although he knows it’s futile. In this moment he can tell that there’s no way he’s going to be able to convince Mayfeld to go into the mess hall. Whatever happened, it’s enough to spook the ex-Imperial, and very little that Din might say is going to change that.

Mayfeld’s face confirms this deduction. “I _can’t_.”

“If we don’t get those coordinates, I’ll lose the kid forever,” Din tells him. If Mayfeld isn’t going to do it, Din will kriffing do it himself. He holds out his hand. “Give me the data stick.”

“It’s not gonna work,” Mayfeld says, shaking his head. “In order to access the network, the terminal has to scan your face.”

Oh. That is… a problem. Din is momentarily frozen with indecision, his own words ringing in his ears. _I’ll lose the kid forever._ There aren’t any other terminals within a reasonable distance to the Karthon Chop Fields. (He knows. He spent a couple of loops looking for others.) This is their one shot, and he cannot afford to have it fail. He’s failed enough already. He’ll just… take off his helmet and let the machine scan his face.

Sure.

“Let’s go,” Mayfeld prompts, quite obviously assuming that Din will do no such thing.

Din pushes his hand toward Mayfeld. “Give it to me.”

Mayfeld regards him with extreme skepticism, but he hands over the data stick all the same. The walk across the officer’s mess seems to somehow both take a lot longer than it should and also be over far too soon. He finds himself standing in front of the terminal before he knows it—before he’s really ready—but he can’t just stand there like an idiot. So he plugs in the data stick, and immediately the machine tries the scan.

 _Error, error,_ the terminal announces. _Facial scan incomplete. Ten seconds to system shutdown. Ten, nine, eight…_

He can do this. Just take off the helmet. No one is looking (he knows this is a lie, even as he thinks it). He’s spent the last couple of weeks meeting people who have challenged his views of what it is to be a Mandalorian. If the woman who was Mand’alor can show her face, why not him? And no matter what, the kid is worth it. Grogu means everything to him. So he needs to just… do it.

 _…two, one. System shutdown complete. This terminal will now self-destruct_.

He cannot do it. His hands are only halfway to the helmet before the countdown ends. Din manages to think _what?!_ in the instant before the terminal in front of him explodes, sending bits of shrapnel tearing through the brittle plasteel armor.

 _Dank farrik_. He failed. Again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok, so I added the self-destruct function on the terminal for story reasons, lol. But it sounds like something the Empire would do, right?? Also I think this is the most touch-starved that I've ever written Din, and I'm not sure why it came out that way, but it did. Up to this point he's been mostly holding it together (mostly) and trying to only focus on the mission, but we'll see that breaking down in the next chapter!
> 
> Thank you so much for all your comments, they really do make my day hearing how interested you are in this story!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay on this chapter! It turns out that writing two people talking about stuff like this is HARD. Who'da thought? But I finally got them to sit down and work through things, and I think y'all will be happy with where this chapter goes.

Not changing anything the next go-around—not _talking_ about it—was probably not the best plan. It was just… well, he thought maybe he could handle it without having to really think too hard about it. Now that he knew it was coming, he’d be prepared. No need to bother anyone with his issues.

Only, it didn’t really turn out like that. By the time he’s putting on the stolen helmet and realizing that before too long he’d have to be taking it off again, this time in a mess hall full of Imps, it’s too late. There’s no time to talk. So the anxiety twists tortuously in his gut, and it only gets worse as he has to sit there and listen to Mayfeld spout off about crossing lines.

Maybe they aren’t all that different after all. But then again, Din hasn’t managed to actually _cross_ that line yet. Anyway, it feels less like stepping across a line and more like trying to leap across a vast canyon while also having no idea what’s on the other side.

He considers whether he might be able to convince Mayfeld to take the risk and go into the mess hall, but it seems unlikely. The man had been pretty stubborn in the previous iteration, and in Din’s now considerable experience, it’s very hard to change someone’s mind from loop to loop without a very good reason. Still, he does try when they’re standing outside the door.

“C’mon, Mayfeld. How many times did he even see you outside of your normal uniform?”

“Enough. I was a sharp shooter, not a storm trooper, in case you forgot,” Mayfeld explains sarcastically. “If he recognizes me before I get the coordinates, it’s lights out.”

“What about after?”

Mayfeld furrows his brows. “Huh?”

“What if he doesn’t recognize you until _after_ you get the coordinates?” Din asks.

“Well I guess that doesn’t matter much, right? Once we have them, there’s no need to lay low. There are only a few guys in there. I’d say we can take them out and make an exit quick enough,” Mayfeld says. “But I ain’t taking that risk. Sorry, man.”

This time Din’s hands make it all the way to the helmet before the countdown expires. He doesn’t quite know why he chokes this time. He was _prepared_. He knew it was coming. But when that voice starts annoucing the numbers, everything just seems to go dark, and his limbs feel like lead. The Armorer’s voice rings deafeningly in his ears until he can’t even hear the countdown anymore.

_Have you ever removed your helmet?_

Maybe he wasn’t so prepared after all.

* * *

“Wait wait wait— You’re telling me that you’re trying to take off your helmet? _In front of other people?_ ”

“Yes.”

“Oh _hell_ no. What—? I can’t— there _has_ to be another way. We’ll find another way, I promise you. I’ll go in, scan be damned. Or I’ll just make _sure_ that Mayfeld will do it. You know how convincing I can be. Oh! Or what about if we…”

* * *

“Wait wait wait— You’re telling me that you’re trying to take off your helmet? _In front of other people?_ ”

“Yes.”

“Oh _hell_ no. What—? I can’t— there _has_ to be another way. We’ll find another way, I promise you. I’ll go in, scan be damned. Or I’ll just make _sure_ that Mayfeld will do it. You know how convincing I can be.”

“Cara—”

“Oh! Or what about if we…”

* * *

“Wait wait wait— You’re telling me that you’re trying to take off your helmet? _In front of other people?_ ”

“Yes, but—”

“Oh _hell_ no. What—? I can’t— there _has_ to be another way. We’ll find another way, I promise you. I’ll go in, scan be damned. Or I’ll just make _sure_ that Mayfeld will do it. You know how convincing I can be.”

“Cara, _please_.”

It must be the way his voice breaks this time, he thinks. Perhaps the weariness is bleeding into his tone in a way he doesn’t even fully realize. But this time— this time she stops, mid-way through the now-familiar tumble of words that’s somehow half a rant, half a rather impressive series of plans. Too bad none of them work.

“Please believe me when I say this is the only way,” Din sighs heavily. “I know you’re just trying to help me. Trying to protect me, even from myself. But we’ve tried a dozen different things by now, and every time the cost is too high. Taking off my helmet is the least of a great many evils.”

What he does not say is that in the vast majority of the previous scenerios, that high cost had been the others’ lives. Sometimes Fennec or Mayfeld, but most frequently Cara. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t died in previous loops, before they’d gotten as far as they had, but somehow those had hit him less hard. Something about _knowing_ that the deaths could be avoided if he’d just managed to take off his helmet cut him to the quick, and the number of times she’d died in his arms certainly didn’t help matters. If losing the kid had opened up a fissure in his heart, each one of those deaths drove another wedge into it, until he feels raw and aching and lost in a way he’d never been to this point.

He hopes that she’ll drop it, but just because she trusts him doesn’t mean that she’s inclined to let this go. Somewhat unfortunately, in this case, she happens to know just how much his creed means to him.

“What do you mean, the cost was too high?” she asks doggedly. “Are you telling me that there are scenerios where you keep your helmet on, where you could get the coordinates, but something else goes wrong?”

“Yes.”

Cara huffs at him, looking rather annoyed. “Have you considered that maybe that those _are_ successful iterations, and that you should stay in one of those timelines?”  
  
“No.”

“ _Well why the kriff not?_ ” she snaps, her voice loud enough that the others might have been able to hear it through the ship’s metal walls.

“Because if the choice is taking off my helmet or losing you forever, I choose the helmet,” Din hisses before he can stop himself. And well, shit. That was more than he intended on revealing today. He briefly considers what it would mean if this is the loop that ends up being completely successful, but decides he’d rather not.

Cara stares at him open-mouthed, apparently flabbergasted by this revelation. Silence stretches between them, and for once he feels like he should fill it, but he’s at a loss. And then he wishes he had anyway, because she does. “You can’t mean that.”

What Din cannot do is even begin to respond to that. He stares at her for a second longer, unable to really read the emotions surging across her face, and then decides to pretend he never heard it. “I don’t need new ideas of how we can do this. We have one that works. Should work. What I need is…” Well, he’s not exactly sure. No, scratch that, he knows, but he likes the idea almost as much as actually taking off the helmet. “What I need is… to talk about it.”

For a moment he thinks she’s going to argue with him some more, but then she swallows, nodding. “Ok. Ok, we can talk.”

Of course, now he has to talk _actually talk about it_. Dank farrik.

“I don’t know where to start,” he admits.

“Well,” Cara says, her voice full of such care it’s almost unbearable, “tell me again what happens when you get to the terminal.”

“When I insert the drive the terminal scans the helmet and gives an error. Then there’s a ten second countdown, and it explodes.”

“And?”  
  
Right. She probably wasn’t asking about what the _terminal_ is doing. “And… I try to tell myself to take the helmet off, but I can’t.”

“Why not?” she asks.

Stars, it sounds like such a simple question, and yet his mouth hangs open and nothing comes out. He makes a kind of abortive gesture with his hand—which honestly, he doesn’t even know what that was supposed to mean—and takes the opportunity to grab it, giving it a small squeeze. It leaves him aching to pull off their gloves and lace their fingers together, like she’d done in the tunnel, but for some reason he can’t quite bring himself to do even this small thing. _Don’t be greedy_ , something inside him says. She wouldn’t deny him, he knows, and somehow that makes it worse.

“Din, look at me,” Cara says, breaking him out of his thoughts. His helmet hadn’t moved, but his eyes had, and how the hell does she always know? “What stops you?”

Something about the question triggers a defensive reaction in him. “I don’t _know_ ,” he snaps, tugging his hand back and folding his arms over his chest. “If I _knew_ I would have _fixed_ it already.”

Cara puts up her hands in surrender and sits back slightly. “Ok, just— what are you thinking about in those moments?”

“Nothing,” he huffs. “Everything’s just blank.” Which is not strictly true, but putting words to it seems impossible. He can already feel the indignation ebbing from him, leaving only embarrassment in its place, so of course the only reasonable course of action is to try to hang onto it like a shield.

“Then what do you _feel_?”

“Look, I don’t think this is going to help,” he says shortly, reversing his earlier assertion. “This time will be better.”

“Din, I don’t think—” Cara starts, but he’s already pushing himself to standing, eager to leave the compartment and get on with the day. What good will talking about it really do him, anyway?

“We should be getting close to Karthon. Let’s just. Get this over with.”

* * *

Talking about what happens at the terminal is just too difficult. Even trying to put the most basic of his feelings into words brings all of that anxiety tumbling to the forefront, and he ends up shutting down every time. It doesn’t help that Cara never seems to understand why it’s necessary. Since that first slip, he has managed to avoid confessing anything too damning, but that just means that all she gets is some vague answers about it being only the way. He can practically _see_ the wheels turning as she continues to try to think up ways to “save” him from having to remove his helmet, even as she tries to be supportive.

One morning he wakes up with an idea. Maybe he’s looking at this the wrong way. What if the discussion was just “theoretical,” if Cara didn’t know at the start that removing his helmet for the mission was the end goal? He should be able to find the time to brief her on the mission later, maybe on the way from Karthon to Morak, and that would leave the quiet, early hours for the discussion. The idea still isn’t thrilling, but perhaps it will be doable, and he’ll take what he can get right now.

Before all of this ridiculous looping had started, he’d begun the day by telling Cara more about what had happened since he had left Nevarro. It seems kind of like a step backward to return to that, after everything they’ve been through. But he has to remind himself that he’s the only one that’s been through it, really; to Cara, there is nothing unusual about this day. Yet.

He waits until there is a lull in their conversation as they both check over their weapons (and has to stop himself from telling her that actually, she won’t need that particular blaster today). “I’ve been thinking,” he ventures, as casually as he can manage.

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Cara smirks, glancing up at him. He smiles under his helmet despite himself, though something in the tension of his shoulders must give him away because her expression sobers quickly. “What about?”

Din takes a deep breath to steady himself. He’s said the words in his head several times by now, but saying them out loud feels different. Which, he supposes, is entirely the point. “All I’ve ever known about Mandalorians, I learned from the Tribe. ‘Children of the Watch’ I guess they’re— _we’re_ —called. I never even knew _that_. And the last few months, meeting Bo-Katan and the others…” He trails off, shaking his head. “How can everything I knew be so wrong?”

Cara sucks in a sharp breath at that, clearly involuntary by the way she tries to cover it. She shifts across the small compartment so that she’s sitting next to him and takes one of his hands in hers, giving it a small squeeze. The action, almost becoming familiar by now, briefly makes him wonder about what might have changed for her in those months he’d been away, to make one of her first impulses to take his hand now. Handholding had never been part of their standard interactions to this point, and yet in so many of the loops it keeps happening, again and again under different circumstances. Before he can get too wrapped up in that thought, though, she clears her throat.

“Not wrong,” she says gently. “Just different.”

“I was taught that you could not be a Mandalorian if others saw your face. That if your helmet was removed in front of others, you could never put it back on. And then I find out that the woman who was Mand’alor—who would be again—removes her helmet and puts it back on as if it is nothing. How is that not _wrong_?”

“Ok, so it’s maybe a little disingenous to pretend there’s no one else out there doing things differently,” she allows. “But I’m sure they were just doing it to protect you.”

“I feel like an idiot,” Din huffs. “It’s not like I was cooped up on Nevarro. All these years bounty hunting, and I never knew. Never questioned.”

Cara shrugs, squeezing his hand lightly again. “Why would you? You never had any reason to.”

“I know, it’s just… I feel betrayed by the only people I could call family.”

“I don’t think that’s it,” she says. Din looks at her sharply, startled by this statement, but she’s just frowing at him somewhat critically. “Not saying you don’t—you feel what you feel—but I don’t think that’s the deeper issue here. I saw you on Sorgan. You were torn by the desire to keep your way of life and the desire to have things just a little more normal.”

“Right,” he agrees, nodding slowly. “And I could have had that, if not for what the Tribe had told me.” Well, maybe not exactly that. At the time he’d been tempted by the promise of a quiet life, but he knows he wouldn’t have really been happy there, for multiple reasons, even if the question of losing his armor and his status as a Mandalorian was a non-issue.

Cara winces subtly, almost imperceptibly, which he doesn’t quite understand, but she covers it quickly and pushes on. “The thing that’s bothering you now, it’s less that you might have had something different. You can make that choice now, but you haven’t. I think you’re afraid if you do, that you’ll lose your family. Again.”

Just thinking about, confronting the idea, makes his chest tighten and his stomach turn, and dank farrik, she’s right. Maybe the covert was a little dysfunctional. Maybe they didn’t always get along, but they were all he had. All he had before the kid, at least. He hardly knows how many of them survived, but he realizes now that he always assumed he’d find wherever they had settled and rejoin what was left of them, once he found the kid’s people. Had never even considered a different path. He might be able to have what Bo-Katan and the others have—the ability to still claim a right to his armor, even after he took off his helmet at the terminal—but that also might mean never being accepted by what is left of his family.

“You don’t have to be alone, you know,” she says, so quietly he almost misses it over the hum of the ship. He looks at her then and thinks that she’s never looked so vulnerable, her dark eyes full of something he can’t quite identify. It’s odd, because he’s the one feeling stripped raw by this converstation. “No matter what, you could have a home on Nevarro. I know Karga and I aren’t family, but we’re your friends. We care about you.” She drops her eyes at that, staring down into her lap. “Maybe that’s not enough, but—”

Din’s free hand moves seemingly without his permission, coming up to brush lightly against her cheek and cup her jaw. The unexpected movement cuts off whatever she’d been about to say and draws her face back up toward his. He stares at her for a long moment, and hopes desperately that he’s not misreading the situation.

“You’re wrong,” he says flatly.

Cara’s brow furrows, and she looks like she’s getting ready to argue. Probably she thinks he’s talking about her assertion that he doesn’t have to be alone. “Look, I don’t think—”

“It’s enough. It’s more than enough.”

“Oh,” she breathes. “Ok, then.”

A tiny, tentative smile curls the corners of her mouth, and all at once Din knows what the answer is. Disentangling his hand from hers, he reaches up and places his hands on either side of his helmet, then starts lifting. He doesn’t get far. In a flash she grabs his wrists in an iron grip, her eyes going wide with shock and something like fear.

“What the kriff are you _doing?_ ” she hisses, trying to pull his hands down.

“Cara, let me,” he pleads. At that her hands drop, but so do her eyes, fixing steadily down into her lap again. Which is definitely not the point. With a sigh, Din finishes pulling off his helmet and sets on the compartment floor next to him. He takes Cara’s hand again, lacing their fingers together. “Please look at me, Cara. I— I want it to be you.”

Slowly, he reaches up again to tip her chin toward him. Her eyes try to track away from his face until they can’t anymore, and when they finally snap forward her lips part in a gasp.

“That ugly, huh?” he says, because he can’t think of anything else to say. He feels his lips tilt in what might be a smirk. Not that he really knows.

That shocks a laugh out of her. “Not exactly.”

Now that she’s been given permission to look, her eyes flit constantly over his face, never stopping in one place more than a moment, like she can’t possibly get her fill. Her gaze is full of unconcealed wonder, which fills him with a kind of searing warmth that he’s never really known before. The whole thing seems completely unreal, like he’s going to wake any moment from a dream, but their faces are close enough that he can feel Cara’s exhaled breath wash over his bare skin. That is overwhelming enough that he feels his chest tightening again, and he squeezes Cara’s hand perhaps a bit too tightly as he shuts his eyes.

“Are you ok? Din, what’s going on? Talk to me,” she says quickly, squeezing back just as hard.

“Yeah,” he breathes. “Yeah, I’m ok. It’s just… a lot.”

“I bet. Take your time. And you can put it back on if it’s too much. No one has to know.”

Din takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “No. I want this. I… I need it.”

“Ok,” she murmurs. Her free hand comes up to stroke soothingly over his arm, and with every touch he wants more and more. They sit in silence for a few moments more, until Din feels the tightness in his chest ease. He opens his eyes to see her looking at him with care and concern and a hint of confusion. “What did you mean before, when you said you wanted it to be me?”

Well. He supposes now is as good a time as any. “This is going to sound insane. But I’ve been reliving the day. What we’re trying to do today, it fails. I fail. And when I do, the day resets and I try again. I’ve lost track of how many times. More than twenty, at least. You told me to always tell you, and you’ll help me.”

It feels more than a little weird, saying it without the helmet on. He doesn’t really know what his face is doing, if it’s helping or hurting his cause. She seems to be taking it about as well as normal, though, so maybe it’s a wash.

“And this has to do with removing your helmet how…?”

“I have to take it off, in order to get the coordinates for Gideon’s cruiser. In front of several people. Imperial officers.”

“ _What?_ ” she snaps. He can see the fury and outrage on her face, can already _hear_ the words that are destined to come.

“Cara, please, don’t argue with me about this,” he pleads, and maybe there’s a benefit to having this conversation with his helmet already off, because the fight seems to go out of her faster than usual. “It has to happen this way. I’ve tried a bunch of times and never managed to remove it, and I realized this time that… that I wanted you to be the first one to see me.”

She takes a moment to digest this information, blinking slowly as she searches his face. He’s not entirely sure what she’s looking for, or what she thinks she’s going to find there. “Why me?” she asks eventually.

Din laughs at that; he can’t quite help it. If only he could put it into words. “Because… because I trust you with my life. Because you’ve given so much for me and the kid, over and over again, even if you don’t remember it. Because you’re special, Cara.”

Their faces are still close together, pressed shoulder to shoulder as they are in the compartment, and Din makes a snap decision. If it goes poorly, well, there’s always a decent chance he still won’t make it out of this loop, even if he manages the terminal. He’s still never tried to exit the building, to make the escape with Mayfeld, so who knows what might be waiting for them. And there’s still no guarantee he won’t freeze at the terminal, though he certainly feels more confident about it than he ever has before. So he might as well take a shot.

He leans in before he can talk himself out of it and presses a soft kiss to her lips. It doesn’t last long; he’s pulling back before the surprise wears off, and this time he’s the one searching her face for some sign that he’s royally kriffed up. Instead she just looks at him in amazement for a moment before she surges forward, sliding her hand behind his head to tangle in his hair and pull his mouth harder against hers.

It has been… a _while_ since Din kissed anyone, and in truth he’s never kissed someone like this. Someone that he felt this strongly about. Someone who had seen his face. His chest tightens again but it doesn’t feel like anxiety, it just feels like warmth and joy and— and love. Oh stars, he’s in love.

Before he knows it they’re both pulling back, chests heaving as they gasp for breath. Cara’s hand is still twined in his hair, and he leans forward to press their foreheads together. He can tell there’s a wide, somewhat stupid smile spreading across his face, but he can’t bring himself to care. This _wasn’t_ a mistake. She kissed him _back_. This revelation was not something he ever expected at the beginning of all of this, but it is a welcome surprise.

Eventually Cara sits back slightly, and Din feels a rush of pleasure to see that she’s also grinning broadly, still looking at him in something like wonder. Her hand slips forward to trail lightly over his cheek, the gentle brush of her fingers sending shivers of delight coursing down his spine. “You have beautiful eyes,” she murmurs eventually.

“Uh, thanks,” he mutters, completely unsure of what to do with the compliment. “No one’s every told me that before. Er, obviously,” he adds lamely. She huffs a laugh at his stupid comment, though, and it makes him smile. Stars, he wants to make her laugh all the time.

“So you’ve lived this day before,” she says.

“Yes,” he confirms, not entirely sure where this is going.

“And is this the first time you’ve actually removed your helmet?”

Din nods. “Yes.”

“So is it safe to say it’s also the first time we’ve done… that?”

“Yes,” he laughs.

Cara chuckles softly, a teasing twinkle in her eyes. “Took you long enough.”

“Hey!” he protests. “I’ve been very focused on— _mphf!_ ”

His excuses are soundly cut off as she kisses him again, though she can’t seem to stop smiling into it. “I take it that there’s quite a bit more you need to tell me about our plans to pull this off.”

“Yeah,” he says reluctantly. By now they must be getting close to Karthon, and although right now he’d much rather just sit here and kiss Cara, he does have a job to do.

“Ok then,” she nods, finally pulling away from him, a look of determination on her face. “Let’s make sure everything is perfect, because I don’t want to forget today.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter to go! Basically the events of the episode, although I'm not going to do a straight recap. I want to have some of what Din was feeling in the mess hall, and some of the aftermath we don't see when he puts his armor back on. Which of course will involve more ~talking~ so it may take me a while to get the chapter up. At least you already know the outcome!
> 
> Thank you so much for all your comments and kudos. They mean the world to me, and they certainly help keep me writing!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay on this! It fought me a bit, not to mention rewriting canon scenes with a bit extra isn't usually the most scintillating task out there. Hopefully _reading_ them will be more fun, lol.

“Trooper!” a voice calls out across the mess hall. “Hey, trooper, pay attention when a superior addresses you!”

Din closes his eyes for a moment, trying to collect himself. This time he’d done it: he had taken off the helmet, the terminal had scanned his face, and he had gotten the coordinates. All they still had to do was get out of there. Theoretically, not that difficult. That was before he apparently managed to draw the attention of the very person he’d been hoping to avoid.

Steeling himself as best he can, he turns slowly to face Hess, who is currently stalking across the room toward him. His heart rate—already racing—spikes further, and a wave of nausea threatens to overwhelm him. Yes, he’d perhaps naively thought they might get out of there without anyone seeing much more than his profile. No chance to dwell on that now. He can _do_ this. He’s prepared. Hess is not the first person to see him without his helmet, because that honor belongs to someone else. Someone he cares about.

That doesn’t mean this is _easy_.

“What's your designation?” Hess demands, glaring at him suspiciously.

Din swallows, and tries to find his voice. “Transport crew.”

“What?”  
  
“My designation is transport copilot.”

This only seems to confuse Hess. “No, son. What's your TK number?”

“My TK number is…” Din trails off. _Dank farrik_. All he has to do is come up with random number, but his mind helpfully supplies nothing at all.

Well, that’s probably it, then. He’s already mentally preparing himself to restart the day, to have to go through all of the explanation and discussion again. Although that _does_ mean that he’ll get to kiss Cara again, so maybe it’s not all bad. He’ll come up with a fake TK number and be ready.

Before he can get much further already planning the next loop, Mayfeld appears at his elbow. “This is my Commanding Officer, TK-593, sir,” he lies easily. “I’m Imperial Combat Assault Transport Lieutenant TK-111, sir. I’m afraid you’ll have to speak up to him a little bit since his vessel lost pressure in Taanab.”

Thank kriff for Mayfeld. Which is not something Din _ever_ thought he would say. He tries to school his expression into something that would support these assertions, but he honestly has no idea what his face is doing. He probably should have practiced in front of a mirror, but, well, he didn’t expect to have to hold whole _conversations_ with other people. Mayfeld glances over at him and meets his gaze for just a moment, and if he’s surprised by finally seeing Din’s face he hides it well.

Hess gives a slow nod. “WHAT’S YOUR NAME, OFFICER?” he asks loudly, and Din has to force himself not to wince at the volume.

If coming up with a random number was difficult, this request is completely impossible. Fortunately, Mayfeld seems to understand that Din has been pretty much struck mute at this point.

“We just call him Brown Eyes. Isn’t that right, Officer?” Mayfeld says, smiling up at him. Din has no idea what to think of that. _Brown Eyes? Seriously?_ That’s the best he could come up with? This is rapidly getting so surreal that he hardly believes it’s actually happening. Mayfeld claps him on the back and makes to lead him away from this disaster. “Let’s go fill out those TPS reports, so we can go recharge the power coils.”

Din doesn’t really understand how he’s so proficient at making up complete and utter banthashit.

Unfortunately, they don’t get far. “You’re not dismissed,” Hess barks. “You the tank troopers that delivered the shipment of rhydonium?”

“Yes sir,” both Mayfeld and Din answer, as Din briefly forgets he’s not supposed to be able to hear much.

“Well, you two managed to be the only transport today to deliver their shipment. Come with me, hmm? Let’s get a drink, Brown Eyes.”

 _Kriffing hell._ Why won’t this nightmare end?

* * *

Din makes it back to _Slave 1_ in a haze. Even with his face hidden again, he’s so off-kilter from everything that just happened that he barely knows what he’s doing as they climb out onto the roof of the compound and leap onto the waiting deck of the ship. It’s only when they’re standing there, staring down at the mining installation from above, that he realizes that they actually completed the mission.

He got the coordinates. _And_ everyone is still alive. Honestly, after so many loops he was beginning to doubt it was possible to pull off at all. They just have to go pick up Cara and Fennec, and they can leave this nightmare behind.

“Hand me that cycler rifle,” Mayfeld says, snapping Din out of his thoughts for long enough to hand over the gun. Then, to Din’s surprise, he takes aim at one of the rhydonium transports and fires, triggering a chain reaction that blows the entire structure into a fiery inferno. He glances at Din as he lowers the rifle, something meaningful in his gaze. “We all need to sleep at night.”

With a start, Mayfeld’s earlier words come back to him. _I never saw your face_. Maybe Mayfeld thinks that there’s some kind of loophole in the creed, that if everyone that saw Din’s face dies then it’s as if it never happened (there is not). Maybe he’s just trying to give Din the opportunity to lie without the risk of being caught. Or maybe it’s not about Din at all; the conversation about crossing lines and being a survivor seems far away, now, even though he knows it happened only hours ago. He has to admit that there is apparently more to Mayfeld than he had previously thought.

He doesn’t get a chance to change back into his own armor until they set down at the rendezvous point. He finds the bag containing the pieces stowed securely in the compartment he shares with Cara, and the thought of her caring for it makes something clench in his chest. Through all of this, he’s never told her the true significance of his request. Even after everything they’d shared that morning, even after the kiss, he still can’t convince himself it’s a good idea. Just because Din has apparently fallen head over heels doesn’t mean Cara feels that way about him at this point. Maybe someday they’ll look back at this and laugh about the fact that Din’s actions were something akin to a proposal.

Stripping _off_ the stolen stormtrooper armor—the first time he’s actually done so—is a relief, but the prospect of just putting all his beskar back on like nothing happened gives him pause. He expected this, not that that helps him come to terms with it. This act, even moreso than the helmet removal itself, is the fundamental violation of his creed. If another living thing sees your face, you forfeit your claim to your armor. Your right to be called a Mandalorian. By the laws of his tribe he should return his beskar to the community and face his exile.

It’s not _true_ , not really. That thought is cold comfort, though. Somehow the fact that his tribe his all but gone makes it worse. As far as he knows, the Armorer is the only one who is even around to keep to the Way, and he has no idea where she is now. He has nothing to be exiled _from_.

Din manages to convince himself to attach each piece of the beskar that has come to feel like part of his very self, but he holds the helmet in his hand, staring down at it, for a long time. It shouldn’t be that difficult—he put it back on this morning after Cara saw him, after all—but this time is somehow different. It might be the knowledge that there will be no more resets. No pretending that the final timeline might somehow turn out differently. He has made his choices, and he will have to live with them.

He considers forgoing the helmet altogether, at least until he needs to wear it for battle, like Bo-Katan and the rest. It seems like too large a step, though, not to mention the questions he’d have to endure from Fett and Fennec. No, the best course of action at this point is probably to pretend nothing has changed, at least until he gets the kid back. Then he can consider what all this might mean for him in the long run.

A knock at the door of the compartment interrupts his thoughts, and after a moment Mayfeld speaks up from the other side. “Hey Mando, you in there? The ladies are back.”

Din can’t help a smile at the thought of what Cara would say if she knew Mayfeld was calling her a ‘lady.’ He’d once seen her nearly knock a guy’s teeth out on Sorgan for less. Somehow he feels like Fennec might be of similar disposition, even though he knows the assassin far less well.

He puts the helmet on before he can think any more on it, then opens the door in lieu of an answer. “C’mon,” he says, gesturing with his head toward the ramp. “We need to go talk to Cara.”

He and Cara had never discussed the plan to return Mayfeld to the Karthon Chop Fields, and he certainly hadn’t mentioned anything about potentially letting him go, but as in so many things, it seems they are in remarkable concordance. Din almost laughs when Cara suggests that perhaps Mayfeld didn’t make it out alive, even as the man stands in front of them, apparently bewildered by this turn of events. Stranded on Morak with a bunch of pirates probably wouldn’t be what he’d choose for himself, but it has to be better than hard labor.

“You get the coordinates on Moff Gideon?” Cara asks him as they watch Mayfeld disappear into the bushes.

Din shoots her a look, because she knows that the mission was a success, or else they wouldn’t be standing there. The thought occurs to him that maybe she’s trying to makeconversation to avoid talking about what had happened between them that morning, and cold, hard lump forms in the pit of his stomach. What if she has regrets? What if she decided she doesn’t actually feel that way about him?

“We did,” he answers.

“What’s our next move?”

“I have some ideas,” Din says cautiously. He really doesn’t want to have this conversation, but he also doesn’t want to go into whatever they’re about to face not knowing. “Look, Cara, about this morning…”

Of course, then his voice fails him. He’s not sure what he even wants to say, which makes it all the more idiotic that he started this conversation in the first place. He hopes, ridiculously, that perhaps she’ll pick up the thread and save him, but she just looks at him curiously, a faint crease between her brows.

“What…?” she starts, but then her face resolves into something that looks like understanding. “Oh, the helmet thing. I promise I won’t tell anyone. Your secret is safe with me.”  
  
Well. That’s entirely not what he’s worried about, but Din supposes it makes some sense she would think so. “That’s not— I mean, that’s good, thank you, but that wasn’t what I was talking about. I meant what happened… between us.”

“Oh,” Cara says, looking slightly taken aback. He’s not sure he cares for that look. “I— well, er— I guess I understand if you’re having second thoughts—”

“ _No_ ,” he cuts her off quickly, reaching out instinctively for her arm before he stops himself. “I’m not. Having second thoughts, that is.” Din pauses, taking a deep breath, and suddenly wishes they weren’t having this conversation outside. He wants to take off his helmet so she can see his face, because even if he’s still not completely sure about what shows in his expressions, it has to be better than this. “I care about you, Cara. I don’t know what the future holds—hell, I don’t know what the next few days hold—but I know I want you by my side. Whether that’s as a friend, or something more. If— if that’s something you want, that is.”

Cara is silent for a moment, staring at him, and he wonders if he just kriffed everything up. But then a slow smile begins to curl her lips, and she steps forward, placing her hands on his arms just above his elbows. “I don’t know if you noticed how I always drop everything whenever you come to me for help,” she says, smirking at him, “but yeah. It’s something I want. You’re what I want. I thought I made that clear this morning…?”

Din has to huff out a laugh at that, because he is immediately reminded of how many times their planning session for the day had gotten derailed by kissing. “Yeah. You did. Sorry, today has been… a lot.”

“ _That_ is a massive understatement,” she laughs, “and I’m not even the one who’s spent the last month reliving the same day.”

Then Cara pulls him gently toward her, and he finds himself inclining his head automatically until the forehead of his helmet meets hers. She takes a deep breath, her eyes closed, and he can just see her smile through his visor. His own breath shudders through his chest as a knot of tension he didn’t even know he’d been holding finally unwinds, replaced by a blooming warmth that he never wants to fade.

“C’mon,” she says eventually, pulling back to look at him unerringly in the eye again, “let’s go get your kid.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And just like that, we've slotted smoothly back into canon! 😂 Of course, it will all get negated when we (hopefully) see the actual fallout of Cara seeing his face, but whatever. I had a blast writing this, and I'm so glad that so many of you enjoyed it too. Thank you for all your wonderful comments, I'm pretty sure they actually give me life these days.
> 
> My muse has been really fickle lately, probably due to lots of real life stress, but I do have at least a couple of CaraDin stories kicking around in my head right now. We'll see what they turn into! In the mean time, feel free to come bother me on [tumblr](https://cha-melodius.tumblr.com) and let me know what you want to see!


End file.
